


Dr. Spock Mentioned Nothing About This

by Lenore



Series: Bric-a-Brac Verse [5]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: M/M, Mpreg, Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-31
Updated: 2007-03-31
Packaged: 2017-10-13 02:44:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/131952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lenore/pseuds/Lenore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Conventional wisdom about how to have a healthy pregnancy wasn't designed for the Pegasus galaxy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dr. Spock Mentioned Nothing About This

There's a tipping point in the pregnancy, late in the eighth month, when Rodney goes from being mostly maneuverable, even if he is slower than he used to be and his center of gravity is all askew, to feeling like a floundering whale.

Carson frowns at his weekly checkup. "Your blood pressure's up. You need to stay off your feet."

Rodney glares at him impatiently. The data they recovered from the temple on Miraada contained not just the key to producing their own ZPMs, but plans for a weapon the Ancients had been working on, a kind of, well, molecular disruptor. Rodney refuses to call it a disintegrator ray, not because that isn't basically descriptive, but because John shouldn't get to name everything. The disruptor would, theoretically at least, be able to penetrate Wraith shields and destroy anything in its path with a complete sequence of Wraith DNA. Rodney and Zelenka are _this_ close to a working prototype. "You know perfectly well I can't just stop what I'm doing—"

Carson crosses his arms over his chest. "I have no idea if a man made pregnant by alien technology can develop preeclampsia, and I don't want to find out. You're on modified bed rest until the baby is delivered, and that's that." Rodney takes a deep breath, but before he can launch into his invective, Carson raises a hand. "I'm not saying you can't work. Just do it from your quarters."

It's not so bad really once he gets used to it, not that Rodney plans on admitting this to anyone any time soon. The science team comes to him for their daily status meetings, and he can still mock Zelenka's ideas over the radio, and the baby makes a convenient place to rest his laptop while he goes over and over his calculations.

John never comes right out and declares that he's sticking close. He just brings his laptop over one day and leaves it there, and mentions something about how far behind he is on his paperwork. Rodney nods and pretends to believe this bullshit. If he has to be under medical house arrest, at the very least he deserves to have John there to keep him company.

Until a few weeks ago, he would have taken total, naked advantage of the situation, but lately his sex drive has gone the way of shapely ankles. The thought of John without his shirt, down on his knees—which during Rodney's temporary nymphomania was the cause of more than a few frantic calls demanding John's immediate presence—now arouses nothing more than a languid sense of wonder that he could have that, if he wanted. Rodney can't even see his own dick anymore, not without the help of a mirror, and there's something profoundly dispiriting about that.

He does find it somewhat reassuring that occasionally he'll glance up and catch sight of John, sprawled at the foot of the bed, scratching away at requisition forms for ammunition and gun oil, filling out staff evaluations, the play of muscle in his arms as he writes, and his mouth will go a little dry. It's nice to know he's not _dead_.

In the evening, John goes to fetch dinner, and Teyla and Ronon join them, and afterwards, Rodney has a couple more hours of work in him before his eyes start to feel heavy and the formulas blur together and he can't stop yawning. He shunts the laptop off onto the nightstand and heaves himself out of bed to go pee and then settles in with the body pillow a very embarrassed Colonel Caldwell brought back from Earth, that Rodney is pretty sure rivals the wheel and fire in the pantheon of human invention.

"I just have a little more to do before I turn in," John's voice drifts over to him.

"Mmm-hmm," Rodney murmurs.

He's always been able to fall asleep in any conditions, light, noise, doesn't matter, and this stage of pregnancy makes him feel slightly drugged all the time. He dozes off, and stirs only slightly when he feels John curl up against his back, just long enough to sigh contentedly and fall back asleep.

It's the next afternoon when the call comes from Elizabeth, "John, report to the control room. Rodney, I'm sorry, but we need you too."

He and John exchange a startled look. Nobody has been more zealous about Rodney's health than Elizabeth. The one time he tried to go over Carson's head and appeal his bed rest sentence, she threatened to take away his laptop if he didn't follow doctor's orders.

Rodney shuffles off to the control room, John's hand at the small of his back, as if trying to hold him up. There's already a small crowd gathered there, not just Elizabeth and the regular duty shift, but Ronon, Teyla, Zelenka, Lorne. Everyone is unnaturally quiet.

"What?" Rodney demands.

"This." Radek points to the long-range sensors.

Rodney's first reaction is that he must be dreaming, having a fucking _nightmare_ , because there really can't be an entire Wraith armada headed straight for Atlantis.

"How many ships?" John asks tensely.

"Forty-three," Radek says without inflection. "That I've counted so far, at least."

"They're not supposed to know we're here!" Rodney insists.

"Perhaps Michael is back among them once more," Teyla suggests quietly.

"Or they just figured it out," Ronon says. "As much as I hate to admit it, they're not stupid."

That's when it hits Rodney, the hard, cold panic, that this is it, this is how it's going to end, and he'll never even see his baby.

"We can evacuate to Earth if we need to," Elizabeth says, with a reassuring glance in Rodney's direction. "But I'd like to make a stand if we can and fight for Atlantis. How quickly can you get the Miraadan weapon online?"

"A few days?" Radek says uncertainly.

He looks to Rodney, who agrees, "At a minimum."

Elizabeth squares her shoulders. "You've got sixteen hours. John, I'll need you to prepare our other defenses in case the weapon isn't ready in time."

He nods, and touches Rodney's shoulder, and Ronon, Teyla and Lorne fall in with him. Rodney heads off to the lab, and ignores Radek's well-meaning glances at his belly, and at last Radek clears his throat. "Rodney, do you really think you should—"

Rodney snaps, "Oh, please! Do you honestly think she's better off if I'm exiled to my quarters right now?"

Radek's expression goes soft with understanding.

Rodney doesn't usually call the baby "she," not out loud, not to anyone but John, his faith in the predictive power of Carson's voodoo shaky at best. Secretly, though, he likes the idea of having a daughter, and in the evenings sometimes, he'll pick up the book Elizabeth found somewhere and donated to the cause, and read out girl's names he likes, _Calliope, Jocelyn, Arabella_. So far, John's reaction has always been the same faint lift of the eyebrow. _This is how you lost your naming privileges around Atlantis, you realize._

Everyone in the lab stops and stares when Rodney walks in, and then they spring into action. Simpson gets him a chair, and Miko flutters around asking if he's warm enough, if she should turn up the environmental controls or get him a sweater.

Kavanaugh crosses his arms over his chest. "The prototype's power supply is still unstable. If it's not a lead-lined sweater, it's not safe for McKay to be here."

"I already thought of that." Radek moves over to the console. "I'm initiating a containment field around the weapon and the rest of us. If something goes wrong—" He makes a wry face. "At least, Rodney and the baby will be okay."

"Oh, come on!" Rodney protests. "How am I supposed to make adjustments from this side of the force field?"

Zelenka is stubborn, "I will make the adjustments. You will order me around like a slave. This has always suited you perfectly well in the past."

They set to work, and not an hour into it Rodney is already tired and convinced that the entire enterprise is depressingly futile. The baby shifts inside him, kicking fretfully. His hand goes instinctively to his stomach, and he thinks at her, "Lay off the pancreas. I'm going to need that." She always gets active when he's still, downright nocturnal when he's trying to sleep. The motion of his walk lulls her, Carson explained once, and John often asks, Why don't you complain more that she's keeping you up at night? And the thing is: this isn't anything Rodney is supposed to know, how it feels to have something alive inside him thing. That the experience now exists alongside the mass death he's coolly plotting is a contradiction he can't afford to dwell on.

The team makes progress, and then there's a setback, and everything starts to blur around the edges, all except the work and John, who keeps materializing with water or a power bar, cool touch of his fingers on Rodney's hand, words close against his ear, "You're no good to anybody if you keel over."

At one point Rodney must actually nod off, because everything goes muffled and his eyes aren't stinging for the first time in hours. When he snaps awake again, Radek has an impatient look on his face, as if he's waiting for an answer, and Rodney says huffily. " _What_?"

Radek pushes his glasses back up on his nose, blinking tiredly. "Maybe you should—"

"No! I'm fine!" Rodney says hotly, more out of stubbornness than conviction.

The only breaks he takes are to pee, which at this point in his pregnancy is something of a time commitment. He trudges back from the bathroom, and his feet seem really far away. He's always been able to power his way through anything, but nine hours in, he honestly doesn't know how much longer he can last.

John has finished making preparations for whatever feeble resistance they can offer without the weapon, and he's taken up a permanent station next to Rodney's chair. He glances up at Rodney's approach, his forehead creasing sternly, and Rodney must really look awful, because John is quickly at his side. "That's it. You have to get some rest."

Rodney puffs up, indignation strangely reenergizing. "We're at a critical point! If we can just keep the power supply from overloading— We're this close!"

John opens his mouth to argue, and closes it again, and finally says, "Come on." He puts a hand on Rodney's back and propels him out into the hall.

Rodney sputters, "You can't just—"

"Walk out to the balcony with me. Fresh air will help you wake up, and you can use the exercise. Carson warned us about blood clots when you started the bed rest. You've been sitting still most of the night."

"Oh." Rodney lets out his breath and leans into John. "Okay."

John tightens his hold on him.

The night is cool, and they stand at the railing, staring out into the bottomless dark of the ocean. "I don't want you waiting around here until the last minute," John says gravely. "If we evacuate, you're the first one through the gate. I'm serious, Rodney."

Rodney shoots back, "Well, I don't want you rushing off to do the impossible and getting yourself killed and leaving me to be a single parent. I'm just as serious about that."

John presses a kiss to the top of his head. "You know I have to—"

Maybe it's the mental picture of John pulling one of his crazy-noble stunts that jumpstarts Rodney's brain, because suddenly _there it is_ , and he's crackling with energy. "Of course!"

"What?" John goes instantly alert. "Did you figure it out?"

"Radek!" Rodney yells into his radio, breaking out into a run, or at least the closest he can get to running, firing off instructions as he goes.

His team hauls ass implementing his idea and finally manages to stabilize the power supply. Zelenka takes Simpson and Kavanaugh to help him integrate the weapon into the defensive array.

"You'll need to operate it from the chair," Rodney tells John.

He nods, and hesitates, and then takes Rodney's face in his hands and kisses him soundly. Everyone else in the lab gets suddenly very busy staring at their computer screens.

"Here." John pulls his gun from his holster and presses it into Rodney's hand.

"I'm serious," Rodney mutters thickly.

Then John is gone.

Rodney goes to the control room, takes up a position at the console where he can monitor the weapon.

Radek soon joins him. "You can bring it online now."

Rodney taps his radio. "Colonel Sheppard, we're ready. The beam doesn't have a wide dispersal, so you'll have to be fairly targeted with your aim."

"Understood."

Rodney types in the activation sequence, and the weapon starts to power up.

"Fifteen percent, twenty percent," Chuck calls out.

Then there's a noise, a bad, power-draining kind of noise, and the indicator goes dark.

"What happened?" John's voice comes tensely over the radio.

"I don't know!" Rodney works frantically at the controls, trying various adjustments.

"Wraith vessels entering the solar system," Chucks announces.

"Switch from cloak to shield," Elizabeth orders.

No one else says a word, but the tension of waiting makes it feel almost noisy, and then Rodney makes one more adjustment and the power indicator lights up again.

"Twenty-five percent," Chuck's voice rings out triumphantly. "Thirty, thirty-five…"

Zelenka stations himself at the sensors. "Wraith vessels powering up weapons."

A moment later, Rodney is grappling at the console, hanging on, the impact of weapons fire on the shield rocking the room.

"Disruptor fully charged," Chuck informs them.

"Fire at will," Rodney tells John.

Everyone in the control room has their eyes glued to the monitor, and a red beam comes into view, hitting a Wraith cruiser and then a hive ship.

"Two Wraith vessels adrift," Chuck calls out. "I'm reading no life signs."

Rodney unconsciously reaches for the gun, tightens his hand on it, and the red beam continues to dance across the screen, stopping Wraith ships in their tracks.

Chuck announces, "The remaining ships are powering up their hyperdrive engines."

The red beam zigzags more determinedly, and several more ships go dead before the rest jump to hyperspace.

"How many did we get?" Elizabeth asks.

"Thirty-seven, ma'am," Chucks answers with a smile.

She nods and radios the jumper bay, "Major Lorne, take your team and secure the Wraith ships."

"Yes, ma'am," Lorne's voice booms enthusiastically over the radio.

All the jumpers launch, and it's a time-consuming process, boarding each foundering ship, searching, confirming that there are no surviving Wraith. Rodney drifts off at some point during the process, gun still in hand, and doesn't wake up again until someone tries to take it from him.

Sheppard is standing over him. "It's okay. It's over now."

Rodney yawns, and before he can drag himself up from the chair, Carson shows up with the blood pressure cuff.

"No arguments," Carson tells him sternly, and Rodney dutifully holds out his arm.

He's too tired to even bother muttering "witch doctor."

Carson purses his lips. "It's not especially _good_ , but I think we can get by without a stay in the infirmary." He points a finger at Rodney. "As long as you go to bed and stay there."

John walks Rodney back to his room and tucks him in.

"I won't be able to sleep if you don't stay," Rodney threatens, voice drowsily slurred, not even remotely convincing.

John laughs softly and slides in next to him, arm going around his waist, hand settling on his belly, chin resting on Rodney's shoulder. "You smell, you know."

Rodney snorts. "Is this how you sweet talk people who might be carrying your child?"

John tightens his arm around Rodney, kisses the back of his neck. "Only the ones whose sheer brilliance saves all our asses."

Rodney would smile at this, but he's already asleep.


End file.
